African American Freedom Struggle Vocab

Affirmative action – the idea that government should provide some preferential treatment in hiring or school placement in order to make up for past historical injustices and discrimination

Afrocentrism – the idea that Black people in the US should focus attention on building a Black cultural identity and on getting Black culture into the education system

Boycott – withdraw from commercial or social relations with (a country, organization, or person) as a punishment or protest

De facto segregation – unwritten, habitual, or traditional unequal treatment of white and black people in the US.

De jure segregation – laws leading to unequal treatment of white and black people in the US.

Freedom Rides – an organized movement by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee to ride Greyhound buses throughout the South in an integrated manner

Freedom Summer – a campaign to register African Americans to vote in Mississippi

Ghetto – originally an area of a city where Jews were concentrated, but in the US a place where African Americans are concentrated in poverty

Integration – the process whereby people of different ethnicities or genders are mixed together into a common group and treated equally

Interposition – In US history, the primarily Southern political doctrine that states had the right and the duty to stand between the federal government and the people when the federal government was violating the Constitution. The Supreme Court has ruled that this doctrine is not legally justifiable.

Restrictive covenant – a property ownership agreement restricting the sale or rental of property to African Americans (during the period in question)